Our session of Tuesday, May 19, 2026 will come to order.

And Madam Clerk, will you please call the role?

Yes, Mr.

President, thank you.

Councilmember Scott Benson.

Scott Benson, I councilmember Letitia Johnson.

Councilmember Denzel and Tom McCampbell.

Council Member Renata Miller.

Present.

Council member Gabriela Fancy Mero.

Councilmember Mary Waters.

Member Waters did send the memo indicating that she would be delayed.

Clerk will sum up, Mr.

President.

Council Member Angela Whitfield Callaway.

Council President Pro Tim Coleman Ayon II.

Here.

Council President James Tate.

Here.

Mr.

President, you have a prayer.

Thank you.

Now in session.

Uh, we would now like to begin the collection of public comment cards.

If there's anyone who would like to provide public comment, if you're in the committee of the whole, please raise your hand and somebody, my team will come by and provide you with one of those public comment cards.

We got a hand down here.

If you are at home and you would like to provide comment to the body, please raise your hand on Zoom and you will be placed into the queue.

Again, if you are looking to speak before this body at uh the time we have public comment, please raise your hand if you have not received the car because we're going to be cutting off the collection of public comments, uh, collection uh very soon.

But right now, we would like to now introduce the pastor providing this morning's invocation.

We have none other than lead pastor Josh Shockley of the Motor City Church, located at one 50 Michigan Avenue in District 6.

Give him a round of applause.

Pastor Choppy, thank you for joining us.

And the floor is real so good being.

Good morning.

Thank you so much for having me.

Uh, what an honor.

Before I begin, I want to say thank you so much for having me, but also thank you for all that you do.

I know a leadership positions, you can also be on the receiving end of some problems and things like that.

But I just want to say thank you for the hard work that you guys do day in and day out to make Detroit the greatest city in the nation.

So thank you so much.

Um, for those of you that attend church, you know, us preachers often have difficulty with staying in our allotted time, but I promise you I'm gonna do my very best to keep within the time frame.

Uh, when I was uh approached about coming to pray today and share a quick word, I was thinking about what would it be that I would share.

And I was reminded of a story uh that I pray would encourage all of us in the room uh today.

Uh many years ago, there was a man that was incredibly wealthy, multi-billionaire, in fact, and uh he accumulated his wealth uh by being an architect.

He designed some of the greatest homes in the entire world.

And there was one man that would build these homes for him.

And uh this man was getting older in his years, and he went to his boss, the architect, and he said, Boss, I'm ready to retire.

I I put in all of these years, but I'm ready to be done.

And this incredible architect, he looked at this man and he said, Would you build me one last house?

I've been putting pen to paper for many of years to draft up the nicest house I could ever imagine.

He said, You're the only guy that I think that could do this well.

So he said, you know what?

I'm tired, but I'll build this one last house for you.

The man the builder, he looks at the blueprints and he realizes, wow, this is the nicest home that this man has ever designed.

So he begins to start working, and about halfway through the construction process, keep in mind he's tired, he's ready to retire.

But he realizes this is gonna be a lot more difficult than I thought it would be.

So he begins to cut corners.

He doesn't lay the foundation the way that it should be laid.

He cuts corners over here where the stairwell, he said, man, that's gonna be too difficult.

So I'll do it this way.